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I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

wilwheaton.net

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Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#331

Post by dang »

noasaservice wrote: post #297
fristechill wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parents, love your children, as much as you can. Children, honour your parents, as much as you can. The alternative is resentment, a condition toxic enough to keep anyone in hell.

Quoted post unavailable.

Please don't post in the flamewar style to HN, regardless of how wrong someone's religion is or some parents are or you feel it/they are. Perhaps you don't owe bad religion or bad parents or bad internet comments better, but you owe this community better if you're participating in it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Edit: you've unfortunately been breaking the site guidelines quite a bit recently. Could you please not? We have to ban accounts that do that—because it's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for—and I don't want to ban you.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#332

Post by bobthepanda »

trbleclef wrote: post #254
ludston wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's quite possible that the musical skills you picked up from your piano lessons are reason why you had the "talent" to picked for your schools chorus.

As HN's only? lurking non-swe choral director I'll just pipe in and say that every school should have a chorus that anyone can be in without being "picked", in addition to any auditioned levels. You can learn to sing the same way you can learn any other subject/skill; that is to say it's entry-level.

To clarify, when I say picked I mean that for whatever reason at my high school every incoming freshman was screened for ability and if they were alright they got in.

There was a similar screening process for the ability to swim, though it was actually for selecting those who could not and teaching them.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#333

Post by KolenCh »

wahern wrote: post #33
irjustin wrote: post #8

Wow Will was such a part of my childhood watching Star Trek. Obviously, he didn't appear often but he was memorable simply because there were so few people as young as him on the show. Sad to hear this all around. This also brought back memories of me being required to play piano growing up. I hated piano, performing (recitals), playing in general. I was terrrribbleee (still am) and was put up in lessons for 12 years…

> Music is a very "asian" or "chinese" thing to put your child through. Asian culture simply adopted American and English culture in this regard. In the United States circa 1950s and 1960s it was very common for children to be taking piano lessons, and owning a piano was also relatively common. Both the lessons and the piano itself were important status symbols, and having both were considered markers of being middle…

I’m not sure if your statement about Asian adopting this idea from the west is right, but in ancient times a Chinese scholar has to excel at 琴棋書畫, where the first is a musical instrument.

As someone who spent years self learning piano without having a piano to convince my mother to have a piano, I envy anyone why are forced to learn such thing.

I have a younger cousin who in his childhood I encouraged her mother to let him take any music lessons, where she was very reluctant. (Yeah so not all Asian will force you to learn, because it is expensive.) In the end, somehow he got into orchestra in Uni, I’m proud of him.

I’d argue that music training should be mandatory similar to other subjects like math, history, etc. Simply being put through the training progress is good education that you rarely find in other settings. Just like not everyone becomes a mathematician, it’s ok you don’t become a musician too.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#334

Post by ham-sandwich »

jedberg wrote: post #4

Wil was an early user and support of reddit, and I got a chance to talk to him a few times. He's a cool, humble, and generous guy.

I did too but as a part of an rdrama hijink. Produced this incredible post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Drama/comments/7nja5j/someone_made_...

People say the golden age of the internet has ended but I think ^^^ is proof that it’s just beginning.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#336

Post by frosted-flakes »

kzrdude wrote: post #167

Child actors need an independent advocate. A children actors union. If the parents can consent to them working, they’ll have to accept that there is an advocate group governing certain things about their working conditions too. Someone needs to take the children’s side - that the parents and employers don’t always want to do.

It's worth noting that there are already quite strict laws and/or union rules about child actors (under 18). They can only work a limited number of hours per day and month, and can only miss so many days of school, for example.

Laws vary by state (see linked summary by the Department of Labor). Here's California:

> Extensive requirements for theatrical employment: The Labor Commissioner issues permits to minors to work in the entertainment industry with required documentation from appropriate school districts as applicable and/or permits permitting employment of minors in the entertainment industry.

> Sec. 6-1308.7-Work permit to work not more than 5 consecutive days in the entertainment or allied industries; excused from school for up to 5 absences per school year; school districts are to allow pupils to complete all assignments and tests missed during absence.

> Sec. 6750 Family Code - Courts may require a portion of earnings be set aside for the minor in a trust.

https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/state/child-labor/entertain...

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#337

Post by BizarroLand »

adriand wrote: post #247
kibibyte wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ooh, this definitely struck a chord in me, as I fall right into that stereotype. I was forced to play piano for 10 years and to do all those recitals and music theory tests. I could never wiggle myself out of it because of all the guilt-tripping. So of course, I went to college and promptly dropped all of it. And unexpectedly, nearly a decade later, this pandemic thing happened, I returned to piano, recently bought a…

My daughter is 12, she has been taking piano lessons for several years now. About a year-and-a-half ago she started saying that she didn’t want to continue. Hated her lessons, didn’t like her teacher any more, etc. We of course weren’t happy about this because she was playing very well. We do believe in honouring our kids’ wishes, coupled however with the requirement that they meet their commitments: in this case, th…

I like that, I'll be borrowing it myself should I get to have children. If they make a commitment, finish it out to a specific time frame, a year of lessons will go by before you know it! A year of sports, a full season of soccer, make it to the end of the thing you're attempting before you decide to give up on it.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#338

Post by BizarroLand »

jay_kyburz wrote: post #16
manmal wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clarification: I‘m talking about self-actualization & leisure time here, not chores. > What is a healthy amount of pushing vs too much? There is no healthy amount of pushing, period. If you stop applying pressure, children will find their own thing, and that’s the best outcome for them. Just make sure they know the possibilities of what they could do. What would you have liked to do instead of learning piano? Did you…

I have a 10 and an 8 year old, and I don't agree that kids will find their own thing. I have to apply a fair amount of pressure to get 20 minutes of reading homework on school nights. I even have to apply some pressure to get them to put their laundry in the basket and put their clean clothes away. There are heaps of things that just aren't that fun but that are actually important.

Kids have to be pushed to clean up after themselves, to be polite, to mind their manners. Wild children will most often eventually learn to fit in and stay there, but they will take torturous paths to get to that point whereas Stepford children are likely to look great on paper but grow up resenting the people who took away their autonomy for appearances' sake.

Neither extreme (Wild/Stepford) is a good thing, Wild Children tend to get into and cause a lot of trouble, and end up missing out on opportunities both personal and interpersonal due to their lack of grounding and inability to meet societal pressures/standards.

Stepford kids (at least in my anecdotal experience) tend to end up rebelling hard, or developing a need to hide their flaws and issues out of fear of reprisal, and sometimes end up having huge breakdowns because their fundamental emotional and developmental needs aren't being met.

Sounds like Wil was forced to be a Stepford child, and this is the consequence of that, not to mention his mother both abusing him and allowing him to be abused by other people while wringing every penny she could get out of him in the process. That's pretty shitty.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#339

Post by TheAznestWhitey »

bobthepanda wrote: post #88
wahern wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Music is a very "asian" or "chinese" thing to put your child through. Asian culture simply adopted American and English culture in this regard. In the United States circa 1950s and 1960s it was very common for children to be taking piano lessons, and owning a piano was also relatively common. Both the lessons and the piano itself were important status symbols, and having both were considered markers of being middle…

as a second generation Chinese American, at least growing up it seemed like keeping up with the rest of the community, but it wasn't really so much about being middle class, but more about the kind of "so and so's child is a star tennis player, a pianist, the class president, speaks three languages, and they're probably going to get into Harvard and my child is going to need to keep up."

Went to high school with the daughter of Chinese immigrants like that. Star tennis player, stellar pianist, 1st chair violinist in the city's youth orchestra, valedictorian, ivy league med school, doctor, etc...

Some people are just built differently.

Re: I was forced to be a child star. It was never my dream or my idea

#340

Post by ntlk »

alfiedotwtf wrote: post #289
ntlk wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is it. There are periods in life when the time for practice is more likely to be freely available. As an adult there are other responsibilities to be negotiated. I’ve made life choices that now result in having uninterrupted blocks of time for learning to play an instrument in my thirties. I’m surprised at how quickly some things become completely effortless when you have time to practice every day.

Exactly. I now have an alarm that goes off every day after dinner, where I force myself (no matter how dead tired I am) to sit at the piano and play at least an hour. But like going to the gym, the hard part is getting there. Once I'm playing, I look down at my watch and it's been over 2 hours!

I’m exactly the same. Sometimes I think, ok, just ten minutes, and before I know it I made a ton of progress and spent an hour enjoying the process.
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